Local Dialects in Hordaland

Language tells us both about social distance and human contact in many different ways. The dialects show how people who have had connections and dealings with one another throughout the ages, have developed a common language. Thus the geography of our dialects tell us of our cultural history - with evidence from the oldest settlements to the migrations which took place in the 20th century, when our new industrial centres were built. The similarities and differences in the local Hordaland dialects can thus be interpreted as evidence for contact within the county and routes of communication outside Hordaland. The Bergen dialect is distinguished by exhibiting international contacts right back to the Middle Ages and the Hanseatic period. The so-called “burr” (or uvular ‘r’ sound) is also of international origin. It is claimed that this had its origins in the speech impediment of a French king. This spread from the court in Paris along the international lines of communication to Copenhagen in the 18th century and a little later on to Bergen. The rapid spread of the burr today in Hordaland is an expression of how contacts and lines of communications operate in our times.